


eve

by faerietell



Series: the way you look at me [2]
Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, F/M, Zutara, Zutara Month, Zutara Month 2016, except the story is fluffy af, poor sick zuko, so angsty
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-12-31
Updated: 2016-12-31
Packaged: 2018-09-13 17:49:02
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9134665
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/faerietell/pseuds/faerietell
Summary: A fever-stricken Zuko expected to spend his Christmas Eve alone. He should have known better. After all, his friends seriously had no concept of privacy.





	

The first ten years of his life had been spent in Japan, and he had endured those stifling and suffocating summers. He knew heat, how it was unbearable in those dry, long months and then kinder in the cold winters. But there was no heat like this, the kind of heat that left him trapped in his skin and his sheets sticky with sweat. His lungs ached with coughing, and his throat sore. All he could taste was the raspberry-flavored medicine he had downed an hour ago, but he was still too _hot_.

Zuko was used to taking care of himself, but he hadn’t been sick in a while. He had been a sickly thing as a kid, when his mother could dote over him and pressed cool damp linens to his forehead. Somehow, after she died, his body knew better.

He twisted in the sheets again, sitting up to pull off the deep red t-shirt. He had kept it on because he had some fevered notion he was supposed to, but God, what did he know? All he could feel was heat, heat, heat.

He lied back down and shut his eyes. In the distance, he could hear two voices in his apartment, but he ignored them. No doubt, they were fevered delusions.

“I don’t see why we had to come by here,” said the female voice. “We’ll be late to Toph’s party.”

“So Zuko could live a little,” said the male voice. Sokka. Why did he have to imagine Sokka? Could his mind conjure up a kinder, softer image? “Corporate shut-in that he is. Beside, no one goes to Toph’s parties early. Not even Toph.”

“It’s his choice,” reminded the female voice. “You did invite him.” This voice was familiar too. Sweeter than Sokka’s, but he couldn’t place it. He supposed it wasn’t the place of the rational mind to understand the delusions. “What happened here? He’s usually so neat.”

“He calls it minimalism,” snorted Sokka. “I call it freaky.”

“Just because you live in a pig-sty,” she retorted.

The voices were closer now, and the bedroom door creaked open. It was beginning to occur to him that this was real. After all, Sokka didn’t have any sense of privacy. He should have never given him the key. “Dude,” said Sokka.

A cool hand pressed on his forehead, and he groaned, stirring in the sheets. “Poor Zuko,” the sweeter voice said. “He’s sick. Really sick. And on Christmas Eve too.”

“So that’s why he hasn’t been answering my memes,” said Sokka. “Hey, he was going to go. Look, he wrapped presents.”

“Sokka, get away from there.”

“Aren’t you curious?”

“No. Get a glass of water.”

“There’s one for you,” Sokka said. “Katara in his nice, pretty boy handwriting.”

Zuko opened his mouth to mumble a protest, but his throat was too dry. Everything was too dry. Katara. He held onto the image of her, her vast eyes that were more ocean than sky, the warm brown of her skin and the softness of her smile.

“Pretty boy?” Katara asked.

That was right. He wasn’t.

She continued. “He’s more the lean, mean type, don’t you think? I wouldn’t call him pretty. Handsome, sure.”

That. That he hadn’t expected. Not with the scar on his face. Sokka had stared at it for a full two minutes when they had first met before uttering a “cool, dude” and moving on. Katara hadn’t seemed to notice it at all, but no doubt, her brother had warned her. Still, he had never expected handsome.

“Lean, mean?” Sokka snorted.

“Well, a jerk,” Katara said. “Get away from those presents and get me a glass of water.”

There was a shuffle of movement, and he could hear the sink running in the kitchen. A hand cupped his jaw a moment later. “Come on, Zuko,” her voice coaxed. “Open your mouth.” He found himself obeying, cool water soothing his dry throat. There was more talking, but he was fading away into the darkness, into sleep.

He awoke later, with his bedside lamp on and stars in the sky. Someone had changed the sheets, and he felt cooler now. “Zuko?” It was Katara. “How are you feeling?”

“Awful,” he croaked, sitting up. “But better.” It was all coming back to him, and he turned to stare at her. “You’re missing the party.”

“Toph’s bashes are the same mortifying, drunk experience each year,” Katara told him, placing the back of her hand to his forehead. “I’m not missing anything.”

“It’s Christmas Eve,” he said.

“I’m flying back to Virginia for New Years,” she shrugged. “Christmas is no big deal for me this year.”

“You hate me,” he finished.

“I think you’re a jerk,” said Katara. “That doesn’t mean I’d leave you to die though.”

“I wasn’t dying,” he rasped. It may have felt like it, but he would have been fine. He was always fine. He taught himself to be like that.

“God, Zuko,” she rolled her eyes. “Just say thank you and move on.”

“But,” another voice entered the bedroom with a glass of water. “You could thank us by letting us open the shiny presents.”

He gratefully took the glass of water from Sokka and downed it in one gulp. Suddenly, he was aware that he was shirtless with Katara in the room. His skin prickled, and he turned to look for the shirt he had cast off earlier. It was nowhere to be found though.

“Don’t bother,” said Katara, following his gaze. “You need to cool off. Besides, it’s nothing I haven’t seen before?”

“ _What_?” He sputtered.

This time, she reddened. “I mean having a brother! Not you specifically.”

That did little to reassure him. However, Sokka interrupted the two of them. “Presents, presents, presents,” he whined.

“I guess it is Christmas,” he said, glancing at the alarm clock that blinked a neon-green 1:25. They must have been here for hours instead of at some party. Guilt began to sweep over him. He really didn’t deserve them.

Sokka didn’t wait. He ripped through his and beamed. “Skullcandy headphones. How did you know?” He stuck them over his head immediately.

“You only hinted it at me a thousand times,” Zuko said dryly.

“Knew you’d get the message, man,” he grinned. When Katara didn’t seem as enthusiastic to open hers, he grabbed it from her hand (“ _Sokka_ ”) and ripped it open for her. She grabbed it from him and pulled out the dreamcatcher, a dark brown structure with soft gray feathers hanging from the circle. Her eyes widened, and he nervously began to talk.

“Sokka mentioned you were having nightmares,” he said quickly. “And I don’t know if your, like, tribe people thing does it. Or if I’m accidentally being rude with your culture because I really didn’t mean to. And it’s not authentic or anything. I just saw it and thought you’d like it.”

She interrupted his rambling by sweeping him in a tight hug. He hesitated for a second before returning it awkwardly. She pulled back, a bright smile on her mouth as she held it up. “Honestly, I don’t know if we do,” she said, glancing at Sokka who shrugged. “But I love it. Seriously. I didn’t get you anything though.”

“Wasting your Christmas eve was more than enough,” he said, heart thrumming in his chest. He hadn’t even been sure if he was going to give it to her. This was more than he had imagined.

“Not a waste yet,” Sokka grinned. “We can’t get drunk, but there’s movies. I’ll put on Home Alone.” Headphones still crammed over his ears, he left the room, leaving Katara and Zuko.

“Thank you,” said Zuko. “For, you know, this.”

She smiled at him. “It’s no problem. Thanks for this.” She held up the dreamcatcher. She leaned in to kiss his cheek quickly before standing up. “Join us in the living room if you feel up to it?”

“Yeah,” said Zuko, watching her leave, dazed. After she left, he sat there for a second with a giddy smile in his face before he schooled his expression and stood up to join his friends.

**Author's Note:**

> i am not responsible for zuko or katara okay


End file.
